HERRING. Ill 



army meets with in its marcli southward. Here it is divided 

 into two parts : one wing of those destined to visit our 

 coasts takes to the east, the other to the western shores of 

 Great Britain, and fill every bay and creek with their 

 numbers ; others proceed towards Yarmouth, the great and 

 ancient mart of Herrings ; they then pass through the 

 British Channel, and after that in a manner disappear. 

 Those which take to the west, after offering themselves to 

 the Hebrides, where the great stationary fishery is, proceed 

 towards the north of Ireland, where they meet with a second 

 interruption, and are obliged to make a second division : 

 the one takes to the western side, and is scarcely perceived, 

 being soon lost in the immensity of the Atlantic; but the 

 other, which passes into the Irish Sea, rejoices and feeds the 

 inhabitants of most of the coasts that border on it. These 

 brigades, as we may call them, which are thus separated 

 from the greater columns, are often capricious in their mo- 

 tions, and do not show an invariable attachment to their 

 haunts." 



This is Pennant"'s account as it regards our own islands. 

 To show that this supposed migration to and from high 

 northern latitudes does not exist, it is only necessary to state, 

 that the Herring has never been noticed, that I am aware, as 

 abounding in the Arctic Ocean : it has not been observed 

 in any number in the proper icy seas ; nor have our whale- 

 fishers or arctic voyagers taken any particular notice of them. 

 There is no fishery for them of any consequence either in 

 Greenland or Iceland. On the southern coast of Greenland 

 the Herring is a rare fish ; and only a small variety of it, 

 according to Crantz, is found on the northern shore. This 

 small variety or species was found by Sir John Franklyn, on 

 the shore of the Polar basin, on his second journey. 



" That the Hen-ing is, to a certain degree, a migratory 



